The Fellowship of Lifea Christian-based vegetarian group founded in 1973

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Literature

Christians, the Bible and Vegetarianism

Christianity and Vegetarianism - what a challenge this
seems to present to the church-going Christian, despite vegetarianism's
enormous and continuing growth outside the Church. Why should it be so?
Are not the cows, pigs and sheep themselves vegetarian, all creatures of
the same Creator? Why is our caring limited to our non-vegetarian dogs
and cats whom we put gently to sleep when the time comes in order to
spare them sickness and pain, while we cause healthy "food" animals and
birds the fear and suffering which are inseparable from the journey to
the slaughter-house; and the very act of slaughter itself, no matter how
"humanely" done? There is, of course, no such thing as "humane
slaughter" - the term simply pulls the wool over the eyes of
meat-eaters, blinding them to the horror and evil of slaughter.

Although the writer has come across several books which indicate that
the Bible has been interfered with, and that the Bible as we know it
today has omissions and contains interpolations and falsifications,
there is still much to support vegetarianism as an ideal, non-hurting
way of life that is so much more in accord with the compassionate spirit
of Jesus' teaching than is the cruel taking of the lives of God's
sentient creatures. Did he not say that He came to fulfil the Law, not
to destroy it? The very first dietary instructions in the Bible are
vegetarian - in Genesis 1:29 we read:

And God said, Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed,
which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in the which
is the fruit of a tree yielding seed: to you it shall be for meat.

Then comes Exodus 20:13 with its Commandment, Thou shalt not kill (no
particular species is mentioned).

They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith
the Lord,

and again in Hosea 2:18:

And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts
of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping
things of the field: and I will break the bow and the sword and the
battle out of the earth and will make them lie down safely.

Ezekiel, in Chapter 4, Verse 9, is given a list of suitable foods:

Take thou also unto thee wheat and barley and beans
and lentils, millet and spelt.

In the New Testament we are told that the meat of John the Baptist
was locusts (beans) and wild honey (Mathew 3:4). James, too, in Chapter
2 of his Epistle, says:

For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not
kill. Now if thou commit not adultery yet if thou kill, thou art
become a transgressor of the law.

So what of Jesus, would he have fallen below these high ideals? It is
nothing short of blasphemy to think of Him cutting the throat of a lamb
to eat it. He Himself said that He came to fulfill the law, not to
destroy it and He warned that His teachings would be betrayed and the
elect deceived. And so it has proved to be, beginning with the Council
of Nicea in AD 325 when the manuscripts were considerably tampered with
in the interests of what was regarded as orthodoxy. And so down to the
present day, when the orthodox Church, far from condemning killing for
food actually encourages it, especially the mass-slaughter of millions
of God's creatures to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Harvest Thanksgiving
services can even be suspect; e.g. the one broadcast on BBC/TV in 1984
which filled me with horror and sadness with its emphasis on the rearing
of cattle and pigs, and this year's (1986) included dairy-farming.

We are commanded to 'love the Lord our God with all our hearts and
with all our souls and with all our minds and with all our strength, and
our neighbour as ourselves.' I feel sure that were He here today, Jesus
would add 'all creation'.

But it is not only Christians who are missing the mark of their high
calling by ignoring the non-hurting, non-destroying way of life as being
applicable to them. Vegetarians, too, are missing the mark of their high
calling, if they, because of the orthodox Church's failure to promote
what they see as the ideal way of living deride all religion and do not
acknowledge that they are what they are because of God's spirit within
them, and which is calling them to even higher things, via the Ten
Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, the suffering of Jesus, to
complete reconciliation with God - which is what religion is all about.

He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord
require of thee but to do justly, and to love mercy and to walk humbly
with thy God. (Micah 6:8)

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

The FoL Killing for Food table appears on the next page followed by:

The misguided belief that creatures must be killed so that we can
feed and clothe ourselves is moral pollution at its worst and most
subtle. All are guilty who create the demand for the products of killing
and cruelty.